The world's largest carnivorous marsupial, devils are the size of a stocky small dog with jaws as strong as a crocodile, which allow it to eat up to half its body weight in 30 minutes. An adult can weigh up to 12 kg.

On Australia's southern island state of Tasmania - the only place where you can find the devils - they are the dominant predator but are now being stalked by a disease that has cut some population groups by 85%.

Wildlife officials said the island's population of the Tasmanian devil, Sarcophilus harrisii, peaked at between 150,000 to 200,000 in 1996, when the cancer first appeared, but they now fear the cancer may kill two thirds of the carnivorous inhabitants by 2006.

The disease has spread widely in the eastern and central parts of Tasmania over the last two years, causing huge tumours that block the animals' eyesight, hearing or mouths, leaving them unable to feed and starving to death.